Living with, or being friends with, a person who has an addiction is an experience that many people dread. Probably most of us have watched a TV drama in which a person deals with the fallout from a chemical dependence. In these storylines, a lot of attention is thrown on the experience of their loved ones. Correctly, it is portrayed as an emotionally fraught experience: fears for the life of their loved one; suspicion that arises when they can’t see or make contact with someone; the arguments that arise time and again. For those of us who have never been in that position, it’s enough to make us deeply fearful.
The overriding hope for all of us is that we will simply never have to go through the dread that this experience creates. But then, nobody chooses to be in the situation where a loved one falls victim to addiction. The best we can do, if it happens, is try to be prepared and to provide support in a way which is both empathetic and effective. Getting the balance right between emotional support and holding someone to account is not easy. Understanding some key facts, which we will set out below, is fundamental to helping someone who is addicted.
Addicted behavior isn’t logical, so it can’t be beaten with logic
We all know the risks that come with drug and alcohol abuse. How could we not? They’re drummed into us from childhood, with plenty of refreshers from popular culture. There’s pretty much nobody, including addicts themselves, who doesn’t realize that the dangers of overdose, long-term illness, and social impacts from substance abuse are real. And guess what? People still use drugs, still drink to excess, and still indulge in risk-taking behaviors to access their substance of choice.
In truth, when someone in recovery goes out and buys drugs or spends a night in a bar, they aren’t doing it because they have weighed up the alternatives and decided that they’d rather use again. The decision is taken on a level far away from the logical centers of the brain; a refresher course on the dangers of drug use won’t make a difference here because this isn’t a decision made on the pros and cons. It’s like an alarm has gone off in the person and the only way to quiet it is to feed a craving. It’s scary to know this, but it doesn’t mean there is nothing you can do. It simply means that recovery is a complicated situation.
Cold turkey is about as useful as it sounds
The idea of kicking an addiction by separating the addict from their “fix” sounds like a simple and foolproof tactic, as long as you don’t understand anything about how addiction works. If addiction could be beaten by just stopping drug or alcohol use for a set period of time, the war on drugs would have been won decades ago. Physical addiction to any substance is only part of the story, and the most basic part, at that. Cold turkey is not recovery; it does literally nothing to address the reasons a person feels drawn to a risky path.
Letting go of the physical addiction is a part of the process, for sure. However, if you don’t address the underlying impulses that led them to try a substance in the first place, then even years of sobriety will not change the odds on a person relapsing. This isn’t simply a naive “addiction is not your fault” reading of the issue of substance use – it’s a hard reality. Addiction is messy and complicated, there is no silver bullet that will defeat it, and if you’re going to be by someone’s side during their recovery, you’ll need to be ready for that.
Nobody needs to “hit bottom”
It’s often said that people will enter recovery when they’re ready, and implied that people will only be ready to face their demons once they’ve “hit bottom”. This can take a number of different forms: waking up in hospital after an overdose; being arrested for reasons related to their addiction; losing a friend they’ve made through their addiction; or seeing friends or family desert them after one transgression too many.
It should go without saying that none of these events are necessary for someone to finally see sense and enter a recovery program such as VA inpatient rehab. Think about it: would you really be comfortable waiting for someone to nearly die from their addiction before stepping in? Are you confident that losing friends, temporarily or permanently, wouldn’t simply convince a person that there’s nothing worth getting clean for?
Some people react to a critical event by entering treatment, and it’s great that they get the help they need, but keep two things in mind: firstly, the sooner someone enters treatment, the less harm there is to undo; and secondly, waiting for rock bottom is a nonsense – there is always a way things can get worse.
Relapse happens, and it isn’t the end
Countless people get clean and sober every year, and the one thing that is important to remember in all of this is that they all have different stories. For some people, they’ll decide to stop using and they’ll make the clean break at the first time of trying. That’s great. Also, some people will get clean at the twentieth attempt and stay that way. As beneficial as other people’s stories are, they’re not always going to be analogous to the situation of your loved one. Sometimes, people will relapse on the road to sobriety. That doesn’t mean they’re not trying, or that their efforts are doomed. It simply means they need to try again.
There’s not a magic formula that means an attempt to kick the habit will work this time. We can use metaphors like stars aligning and boxes being ticked, but the reality is you’re not going to know what will work before it works. We do know that certain things make success more likely. A stable environment to return to; an awareness of how fortunate they are to have the chance to recover; an avenue to deal with the circumstances that made them use to begin with – these are all beneficial. Being met with compassion and enthusiasm for their efforts to get free is perhaps more important than anything else.
It’s not about any one element of the recovery
There is no one way to guarantee the success of recovery from addiction. It’s complicated – that’s a frustrating answer, but it’s the reality. The best advice anyone can give in setting out for a hopefully successful effort to overcome a substance abuse problem is this; don’t try to do it with just one method. It has been proven time and again that having as many strings as possible to your bow is the most effective way to get results. If someone asks “What really works? Tapering off? Replacing the substance? Talking therapies?”, the answer is “Yes”. All of these things can be beneficial.
If an effort to overcome addiction is based on one method, then all that needs to happen for a setback in recovery is that that one method stops working for a moment. If you have more strings to your bow, then hopefully there will always be at least one thing keeping someone with an addiction from relapsing. Think about recovery like it’s crossing a bridge.
Ideally, the bridge will hold and the person recovering will cross it without complication. If they’re wearing a harness, then there’s less reason to worry. And if there is a soft landing below, then there’s even more cause for confidence. Keeping as many failsafes in place as possible can make all the difference.
Being the friend or loved one is exhausting
Being there for someone with an addiction is something we all hope we won’t need to do. But in the event that you find yourself in this situation, you won’t want to turn your back on your loved one; all you will want is for them to be OK. And the reality of this situation is that it is hard. You’ll feel fearful, let down, upset, pessimistic and skeptical – sometimes all of these at once. You’ll also feel exhausted, because it’s not easy to be there for someone especially when you start to feel like you’re more serious about their recovery than they are.
Don’t ignore your own well-being in this time. If you find that therapy helps, schedule regular sessions where you can voice your fears and your frustrations. This isn’t just a case of you focusing on yourself for a spell – it’s beneficial all-around. It is better to tell a therapist “my friend doesn’t seem to care about anyone else – they’re taking from us all and not giving anything in return” than for that to spill out when you lose patience with your friend. There are few things in life that are messier than caring for a friend with an addiction, and sometimes you’re going to be the one that needs a helping hand. Don’t feel guilty about looking for it.
